From Edward Snowden to Miley Cyrus, the most viewed stories of 2013 on the Guardian website varied in seriousness and style
So that was 2013 – the year that Nelson Mandela died, the Pope resigned, Syria spiralled further into chaos and Miley Cyrus licked a hammer. But what were the stories that most gripped Guardian readers? Clue: they weren't all about Margaret Thatcher.
Based on the number of visits to each page, here are the most viewed stories of 2013 on theguardian.com. Figures are correct as of 20 December 2013; we have not listed multiple articles on the same topic.
In the news
1) Edward Snowden: The whistleblower behind the NSA revelations
Monday 10 June 2013
"My name's Ed Snowden, I'm 29 years old. I work for Booz Allen Hamilton as an infrastructure analyst for NSA in Hawaii." With those words, the young whistleblower revealed he was the source of the biggest intelligence leak in the history of America's National Security Agency, and became the face of a story that has convulsed governments and set the news agenda around the world. This exclusive video interview by reporter Glenn Greenwald and filmmaker Laura Poitras became the single most viewed Guardian story of 2013.
We have not listed multiple stories about the NSA (or any other topic) on this list, but the fact that this was one of six stories about NSA secret surveillance in the top 20 articles ranked by page views makes Snowden and his revelations by some distance the Guardian's story of the year.
3.8m page views, 6,194 comments
2) Why have young people in Japan stopped having sex?
Sunday 20 October 2013
Almost two-thirds of men and half of women aged between 18 and 34 in Japan were not in any kind of romantic relationship in 2011. The following year, fewer babies were born in the country than in any year on record. Adult incontinence pads outsold baby nappies for the first time in 2012. What is going on? Abigail Howarth investigated in a piece for the Observer, concluding that marriage, for young Japanese, "has become a minefield of unattractive choices".
3.2m page views, 1,263 comments
3) Boston bomb suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev captured – live
Saturday 20 April 2013
The bombing of Boston's marathon on 15 April convulsed the world's media and shut down much of one of the US's great cities while police sought two suspects. Tamerlan Tsarnaev was killed in a shoot-out four days later, but as this live blog detailed, his older brother Dzokhar was later tracked to a suburb and arrested while hiding out in a boat.
2.1m page views, 4,806 comments
4) Michael Douglas: Oral sex caused my cancer
Sunday 2 June 2013
The Guardian's Xan Brooks was no doubt expecting the usual bland promotional platitudes for Behind the Candelabra during his assigned slot with Douglas in Cannes; instead, the actor dropped a bombshell. His recent throat cancer, he believed, had been caused by the sexually transmitted virus HPV, which he had caught while performing cunnilingus. Medical experts confirmed this was possible; they were more sceptical about Douglas's claim that cunnilingus could also cure the condition.
2.0m page views
5) Aldi confirms up to 100% horsemeat in beef products
Saturday 9 February 2013
Aldi was far from the only retailer to have been caught with extract of hoof in its minced beef products, but this story, almost a month after the scandal first broke, proved of particular interest to readers. The retailer said it felt "angry and let down", the story reported, after tests on Today's Special frozen beef lasagne and Today's Special frozen spaghetti bolognese found they contained between 30% and 100% horsemeat.
1.8m page views
6) Royal baby: Duchess of Cambridge gives birth to a boy – live
Monday 22 July 2013
"The Duchess of Cambridge has been admitted to St Mary's hospital in London in preparation for the birth of her first child," we wrote. "And so it begins," commented RRBA123 below the piece. Seventeen hours later, the Duchess had been delivered of a son and many readers made enthusiastic use of the opportunity to share their views about the royal family. Glad to be of service.
1.5m page views
7) US doctors cure child born with HIV
Monday 4 March 2013
We don't know the child's name or sex, but somewhere in Mississippi state is a toddler of two and a half who was born with HIV but who, after treatment, needs no more medication and is highly unlikely to be infectious to others. "We expect that this baby has great chances for a long, healthy life," a doctor caring for the child told the Guardian. It was, she said, the first ever "functional cure" of an HIV-positive child.
1.2m page views
8) Pope Benedict XVI announces resignation – live
Monday 11 February 2013
Eight years after a puff of white smoke heralded his appointment to the position, 85-year-old Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, aka Pope Benedict, became only the second of 265 pontiffs to step down from the role since St Peter, declaring that his strengths, "due to an advanced age", were no longer up to the job. He would be succeeded a month later by Jose Mario Bergoglio, now Pope Francis and a mere 77 years old.
1.13m page views
9) Glenn Greenwald's partner detained at Heathrow airport for nine hours
Monday 19 August 2013
David Miranda is a 28-year-old from Brazil, and the partner of Glenn Greenwald, the reporter who first revealed Edward Snowden's NSA leaks in the Guardian. At 8.05am on a Sunday morning in August, he had landed in London in transit from Berlin to his Rio home when he was arrested by British officers and questioned for nine hours under terrorism legislation. Miranda was released, but officials confiscated his mobile phone, laptop, and memory sticks, which are still being examined by the Metropolitan police.
1.1m page views
10) Meteorite slams into central Russia injuring 1,100 – live
Friday 15 February 2013
"I was driving to work, it was quite dark, but it suddenly became as bright as if it was day. I felt like I was blinded by headlights." Viktor Prokofief was one of thousands to witness the meteorite streaming across the sky over the central Urals; happily, he was not one of the 48 who were hospitalised as a result of the sonic blast that accompanied it. The Russian Academy of Sciences said the rock weighed 10 tons and entered the atmosphere at a speed of 333,000 mph. Fortunately, it broke up between 18 and 32 miles above ground.
1.0m page views
And the rest
1) Top five regrets of the dying
Wednesday 1 February 2012
Bronnie Ware, a palliative care nurse who spent five years working with people close to death in Australia, wrote a blog about their dying epiphanies before compiling them into a book. This summary of her findings was first appeared in early 2012, but was still the second most read article anywhere on the Guardian site this year. The most common regret of all? "I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me."
3.6m page views, 438 comments
2) Yasiin Bey (aka Mos Def) force-fed under standard Guantánamo Bay procedure – video
Monday 8 July 2013
In a distressing four minutes and 38 seconds, filmed for the Guardian and the campaign group Reprieve by the Bafta-winning documentary-maker Asif Kapadia, the rapper agreed to be force-fed in the same way as 45 inmates at Guantánamo Bay were undergoing each day.
2.6m page views
3) Sinead O'Connor's open letter to Miley Cyrus
Thursday 3 October 2013
"Dear Miley, I wasn't going to write this letter…" 2013 saw a rash of open letters – Stephen Fry wrote to the IOC, Steve Coogan wrote to David Mitchell, Edward Snowden wrote to the people of Brazil – but only one of them involved tongue-flashing pop linkbait Miley Cyrus and a warning not to let the music industry "make a prostitute of you". Sinead O'Connor may have meant it "in the spirit of motherliness and love"; Cyrus didn't quite see it that way.
2.4m page views
4) Can vegans stomach the unpalatable truth about quinoa?
Wednesday January 16 2013
Who says Guardian readers are a bunch of sandal-wearing hand-wringers knitting their own organic hemp underwear and obsessing about the origins of their lentil homebrew? Uh, OK then. This column by Joanna Blythman warned ethical consumers that they were unwittingly driving quinoa prices up in Peru and Bolivia, putting the once-staple grain beyond the reach of poor people there. Sometimes it's hard to be a lefty.
1.8m page views, 1,139 comments
5) Russell Brand on Margaret Thatcher: 'I always felt sorry for her children'
Tuesday 9 April 2013
The comedian's periodic columns for the Guardian this year rarely failed to cause a stir, but this one, about Thatcher's death, proved particular catnip. "When I was a kid, Thatcher was the headmistress of our country," Brand wrote. "She became leader of the Conservatives the year I was born and prime minister when I was four. She remained in power till I was 15. I am, it's safe to say, one of Thatcher's children. How then do I feel on the day of this matriarchal mourning?" Lots of people wanted to know.
1.6m page views, 2,575 comments
Source: http://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2013/dec/27/most-popular-guardian-stories-2013-snowden
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